A new sustainable events space has been created in Glasgow, Scotland, to bring together the local community. An old storage shed in Springburn Park – originally intended to be demolished –has been transformed into an auditorium with tiered seating made from 40 reclaimed pianos that were dismantled and rearranged to fit the space. The new community village holds a theatre, café and outdoor classroom.
The project was pioneered by a local hip-hop artist, Alex Docherty, chair of Friends of Springburn Park (FSP), together with the Glasgow Piano City (GSP) project founder, Tom Binns, and funded by the local council. Binns founded the GSP project in 2013 in a bid to reduce waste and reuse otherwise unwanted instruments. The architecture of the new Springburn Park performance space was also inspired by Pianodrome, an Edinburgh-based group that built the world’s first 100-seat amphitheatre constructed from recycled pianos back in 2018.
Binns and Docherty felt that there was little like the community hub they’ve now created in Springburn, an area known for its high unemployment and drug-use rates. According to a report by the Guardian, Binns’ aim was to “[give] pianos a new life” and bring the local community together in an environmentally-friendly space.
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